• Most new users don't bother reading our rules. Here's the one that is ignored almost immediately upon signup: DO NOT ASK FOR FANEDIT LINKS PUBLICLY. First, read the FAQ. Seriously. What you want is there. You can also send a message to the editor. If that doesn't work THEN post in the Trade & Request forum. Anywhere else and it will be deleted and an infraction will be issued.
  • If this is your first time here please read our FAQ and Rules pages. They have some useful information that will get us all off on the right foot, especially our Own the Source rule. If you do not understand any of these rules send a private message to one of our staff for further details.
  • Please read our Rules & Guidelines

The Lord of the Rings

Jrzag42

Well-known member
Faneditor
Messages
4,002
Reaction score
1,021
Trophy Points
138
Isn't Gandalf the most evil? I mean, if you really think about it...
 

Moe_Syzlak

Well-known member
Messages
3,456
Reaction score
1,165
Trophy Points
118
We recently got a new large 85” tv. I started watching the newest version of Fellowship on it and I was struck by how bad some of the composting looks. I wonder if it’s the new transfer or if I’m just remembering seeing it on the big screen with rose colored glasses as vfx have improved. Anyone have any thoughts on the matter?
 

TM2YC

Take Me To Your Cinema
Staff member
Donor
Faneditor
Messages
14,871
Reaction score
2,384
Trophy Points
228
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
Another re-watch (which I seem to be doing every year now), soon after re-reading the first volume of the novel. I went for 44rh1n's fan re-grade of the Extended Edition Blu-ray again. I was paying particular attention to the background details, those objects, people and places that are never mentioned in the film but are still there to be seen, as they are described in the book. For example, the isle of Tol Brandir, or the route around the left of the Moria pool, even though both are not mentioned, or are edited around, they are still there. The geography and landscapes feel very consistent with the book. I think I might re-watch all the FotR appendices next.

Bring home the epic adventure on VHS!

 

TM2YC

Take Me To Your Cinema
Staff member
Donor
Faneditor
Messages
14,871
Reaction score
2,384
Trophy Points
228
The Fellowship of the Ring: The Appendices - Part 1: From Book to Vision / Part 2: From Vision to Reality (2002)
I love Michael Pellerin's 6-hour journey through the making of 'Fellowship of the Ring' as much as the film itself and will never get tried of re-watching it. You get to hear about so many fun anecdotes, inside jokes, production problems and friendships between the cast and crew, that you feel like you were there (god I wish I had been!). On set tales that bring a smile to the face, like Sean Bean hiking up a mountain because he was terrified of helicopters, Sean Astin having his rubber Hobbit foot surgically removed, so he could have surgery on his real foot, or Viggo Mortensen alarming local police by walking around carrying his sword in the street. I could watch videos about the props, costumes and miniatures all day.




Fellowship of the Ring: Behind the Scenes (2006)
There are several notable differences with Costa Botes' film, over Michael Pellerin's. There are no retrospective interviews-to-camera, this a starker, lo-fi, music free, vérité snapshot of what it was like on the set of 'Fellowship of the Ring'. Another difference is that it's willing to show tempers being lost and nerves being frayed. Pellerin's film isn't a cosy EPK-style whitewash, it has plenty of adversity and production troubles but it doesn't have any scenes like the one where you feel you are awkwardly stuck in the corner of an office, while formidable First Assistant Director Carolynne Cunningham storms in and reads Production Manager Nik Korda the riot act. Considering both films are cut from the same archive of footage (which I think was shot by Botes), it's great that there is so little overlap of material, so this a wonderful complement to the earlier/longer documentary.


If you don't own these already, why not?!? but they can be found on YouTube anyway.
 

The Scribbling Man

Tenant of the Tower of Flints
Staff member
Donor
Faneditor
Messages
4,644
Reaction score
2,416
Trophy Points
148
There's been a recent announcement of more LOTR films in the works from New Line Cinema... Gonna be madness with Amazon's show going alongside as well.
 

Gieferg

Well-known member
Faneditor
Messages
1,489
Reaction score
1,009
Trophy Points
133
In the times we now live in, I can't be happy about that.
 

Moe_Syzlak

Well-known member
Messages
3,456
Reaction score
1,165
Trophy Points
118
@TM2YC Is the Costa Botes one from the EEs? I’ve seen all those docs multiple times. The Pellerin one sounds like that, but the Botes description doesn’t sound familiar.
 

TM2YC

Take Me To Your Cinema
Staff member
Donor
Faneditor
Messages
14,871
Reaction score
2,384
Trophy Points
228
@TM2YC Is the Costa Botes one from the EEs? I’ve seen all those docs multiple times. The Pellerin one sounds like that, but the Botes description doesn’t sound familiar.

Is was not on the original 3 EE DVD releases. IIRC it was later included on a limited edition 3xfilm DVD boxset, then included on the EE blu-ray sets as standard. The complete Botes doc is that youtube link I posted, here are all three:



 

Moe_Syzlak

Well-known member
Messages
3,456
Reaction score
1,165
Trophy Points
118
Thanks @TM2YC. That BTS film is, in fact, the same BTS that is included in the EE extras. Still, I ended up being sucked in again and watching the whole thing. My wife came in halfway through and was also sucked in. Like the Star Wars OT, this was the magic of filmmaking at this moment in time and a kismet of circumstances that will never happen again (as evidenced by The Hobbit trilogy). Just essential viewing for anyone interested in filmmaking.
 

TM2YC

Take Me To Your Cinema
Staff member
Donor
Faneditor
Messages
14,871
Reaction score
2,384
Trophy Points
228
With 'The Towers Towers' re-read, it was time to watch the movie again this weekend (and a long rambling review)...

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
'The Two Towers'
is the weakest of the Peter Jackson trilogy but only in the sense that it's got a few loose threads in a giant near-perfect tapestry. I totally adore re-watching it every time (this time in the Extended Edition version), so I might as well focus on picking apart the flaws, rather than gushing over it's brilliance again. I never liked the way that Théoden is literally and explicitly shown to be under a powerful ageing spell from Saruman, making him an impossibly old man, who morphs back into a King in the prime of his life. In the book (and other adaptations), he is an old man, before, during and after but has been made to feel feeble, powerless and timid by years of Wormtongue's crooked whisperings (it's only implied enchantment might be at play). In the book, Gandalf gives Théoden back his confidence and self-belief with mostly words, so the King rides off to face the danger, but later Théoden is exhausted by his advanced years and remarks that his age was not wholly feigned. His physical frailty but mighty heart, made him a more endearing character on the page. Not that I don't think Bernard Hill does a brilliant acting job. Brad Dourif also plays Gríma very well but the extreme "heroin addict" makeup, milky eye and greasy hair is too much combined with his sinister performance. There is no sense that anybody could've been seriously tricked into thinking this 100% evil looking Gríma's counsels were good. I also don't like the way he is spoken of as if "Gríma Wormtongue" is the name on his passport, rather than "Gríma, son of Gálmód", who is only called "Wormtongue" as a dark joke.

Comparing TTT closely with the book, the film's rendering of the world didn't look quite as faithful as in FotR. It has exactly the right feel for the different lands of Rohan, the Emyn Muil, the Dead Marshes, Fangorn and North Ithilien but the geography is less accurate. There are shots where we see mountain ranges in Rohan that look out of place, or too near and some of the dialogue was wrong. e.g. when Éomer encounters "the three hunters" (who are running north), he should be riding south back down the orc trail, from the eaves of Fangorn but after they talk he shouts "We ride North!" and so apparently goes in the opposite direction to which he was just travelling for no obvious reason. This is because of a wise bit of streamlining in the script, where instead of Éomer heading back south to Edoras and to imprisonment by Gríma, he's already been banished instead, so is presumed to be far away in the north later on, so he can unexpectedly ride to the rescue of Helm's Deep, instead of Erkenbrand of the Westfold. It was a good idea but they didn't get the geography quite right. I hadn't recalled that Erkenbrand originally approached Helm's Deep on foot (from the direction of the Fords of Isen), the heroic horse charge over the mountain into the scattering Orcs is another bit that Jackson lifted straight from Ralph Bakshi's animated adaptation, rather than from the book. In the book, there is quite a bit of business taking place around the Fords of Isen, the Westfold and the Gap of Rohan (the area between Isengard and Helm's Deep) but in the film we never go there.

I'd forgotten that Sam often plays as more of the main protagonist, rather than Frodo in the book. We have much more insight into what Sam thinks about Frodo, Gollum and Faramir, than we do about what Frodo thinks, he is a more internally mysterious character. In the film the weighting is much more on to Frodo. Faramir is changed a lot from the book, where he is a wise, even tempered leader of men and a cunning and subtle interrogator. For story reasons, in the film he's far less intelligent, more corruptible, more pitiable but less admirable. I like the way David Wenham plays him but I like the book version more. It's one of the many things that are stretched and twisted to make this middle chapter more dramatic, when I didn't think it was undramatic to begin with. I'd also include, the stodgy series of flashbacks in the middle (the Boromir one not included), the scramble to establish the Rohan characters (ahead of their natural introduction in the story), the weak Aragorn fake-out death and the extra scenes in Osgilliath. Although I very much appreciate actually seeing Osgilliath, as it's spoken about a lot but not seen (IIRC) in the book.

I hadn't realised how much of the book is not in the film. Unlike in the other two films that trim away a few tangential chapters to keep the story clipping along, TTT removes no chapters along the way, instead it just chops out the whole last third of the book. The final 8 chapters of the book (4 from each half) out 21 are dumped into the third film, which might explain the padding in this movie and the length of the next one. FotR had 22 chapters, with roughly 4 jettisoned, leaving 18 to adapt but RotK started with 19, only two are removed, then an extra 8 from TTT were added, so it had 25 to squeeze in! I can definitely see why ending the TTT film on the high of the Helm's Deep victory was a wise move dramatically (the exact same ending point as Bakshi's film) but I'm less sure dragging the Shelob cliffhanger into the third film was the right idea. This time, with a real war in Europe still happening, the film felt a little different to me. It originally had the post-911 period hanging over it (and briefly threatening a title change) but the ruined streets of Osgilliath and Théoden's line "So much death. What can men do against such reckless hate?" (or it's book equivalent "How shall any tower withstand such numbers and such reckless hate?" make it into a different kind of fantasy-based war movie.




Again only Costa Botes' 106-minute 'The Two Towers: Behind the Scenes' film seems to be on Letterboxd (and incorrectly titled). Michael Pellerin's incredible 6.5-hour epic 'The Appendices' documentary on TTT is not. So I'll review my re-watch of both here:

https://letterboxd.com/tm2yc/film/the-making-of-the-two-towers/

The Two Towers: The Appendices - Part 3: The Journey Continues… / Part 4: The Battle for Middle-Earth Begins (2003)
The behind the scenes problems of 'The Two Towers' reminded me of the somewhat chaotic 'The Hobbit' production, where Peter Jackson and his team are really struggling with how to tell the middle part of a story and deal with the crunch of having a release date set in stone 12-months after FotR. So they are adding scenes, cutting scenes, filming pickup sequences that they've decided are 100% needed for the story, then deleting them anyway, delivering re-written pages to the actors seconds before they are on camera, improvising battle scenes on location, and not only editing the film right down to the wire but still editing the film while poor Howard Shore is across the corridor trying to score it. I remembered there being some juicy tension between Elijah Wood/Sean Astin and Andy Serkis because they were initially treating him like a mere physical stand in, rather than a fellow talented actor, due to this "performance capture" thing being a very new concept (partly pioneered by Serkis). But I'd forgotten about the tension between the key-frame-animation and motion-capture departments over how Gollum should be done and who should handle it. They are trying to be polite on camera but they sound annoyed. Gollum ending up being a real mix of both it seems, as it sounded like Jackson wanted to not hand animate him but the technology just wasn't quite there at this stage, so there was a lot of the animators effectively rotoscoping Serkis' performance by hand/eye. This middle documentary has many of the really legendary Viggo Mortensen anecdotes, like him breaking his toe while kicking the Orc skull but not breaking character, having a tooth knocked out with a sword in the big battle and just calling for some superglue, so the filming could continue and him convincing the cast and crew to camp out by a lake overnight so they could film that epic sunrise shot of Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli running over the plains of Rohan.




The Two Towers: Behind the Scenes (2006)
There is a bit more repeat footage in this 2nd Costa Botes doc and at first, too much focus on "backstage" shenanigans (to alleviate boredom in between shots), too little non-location based footage and not enough heated arguments being captured between the crew but it soon gets into some interesting areas. There is some footage of the massive animatronic Treebeard face acting (before it was replaced with CGI); a deliberately disorienting section where Botes cuts back and forth between the crew building Helm's Deep at two different scales, from similar angles; and some cool unused shots of Éowyn fighting Uruk-Hai in the caves behind Helm's Deep. IIRC the latter never features in either version of the finished film, or in the longer Michael Pellerin making of doc.

 

Gieferg

Well-known member
Faneditor
Messages
1,489
Reaction score
1,009
Trophy Points
133
I like the way David Wenham plays him but I like the book version more

Faramir is probably my favorite change in the movies. Original version of the character just handled the ring way too easily, so it looked not really so powerful anymore.
If I remember correctly that was exactly what bothered Jackson and the rest of writers so they've eventually changed it. In the movies Faramir needs to overcome his weakness to finally become the character he is in the books from the beginning. Thanks to that, the ring's power isn't diminished so much, and Faramir is more interesting than ideal man from the books. The flashback with Boromir provides a nice foundation for his arc too.

Still, I would like to see more of the Houses of Healing with Faramir and Eowyn.
 
Last edited:

Moe_Syzlak

Well-known member
Messages
3,456
Reaction score
1,165
Trophy Points
118
Faramir is probably my favorite change in the movies. Original version of the character just handled the ring way too easily, so it looked not really so powerful anymore.
If I remember correctly that was exactly what bothered Jackson and the rest of writers so they've eventually changed it. In the movies Faramir needs to overcome his weakness to finally become the character he is in the books from the beginning. Thanks to that, the ring's power isn't diminished so much, and Faramir is more interesting than ideal man from the books. The flashback with Boromir provides a nice foundation for his arc too.

Still, I would like to see more of the Houses of Healing with Faramir and Eowyn.

I’d go a step further and say that EE Faramir is the best version of the character. I felt both the book and the theatrical edition didn’t do the character justice.
 

Gieferg

Well-known member
Faneditor
Messages
1,489
Reaction score
1,009
Trophy Points
133
I dont really remember how it was in theatrical edition as I've last seen it in theater back in 2003. So of course the EE is what I think about.
 

TM2YC

Take Me To Your Cinema
Staff member
Donor
Faneditor
Messages
14,871
Reaction score
2,384
Trophy Points
228
Faramir is probably my favorite change in the movies. Original version of the character just handled the ring way too easily, so it looked not really so powerful anymore.
If I remember correctly that was exactly what bothered Jackson and the rest of writers

You are correct. The line they specifically mention in the making of materials as being problematic from the book is Faramir saying he wouldn't even touch the ring:

"What in truth this thing is I cannot yet guess; but some heirloom of power and peril it must be... (edit)... I would not take this thing, if it lay by the highway. Not were Minas Tirith falling in ruin and I alone could save her"

But this is said when he didn't yet know what this "thing" was and in the context of just learning that this "thing" drove his brother mad. Plus Faramir as a keen student of Gandalf had read his Gondorian history books, so already had some idea of how dangerous and evil "Isidur's Bane" was.

As I say in the review, I can see why they'd want to make this change for story reasons, having gone to great efforts to dramtise the corrupting evil of the ring in FotR but lots of characters in the films aren't corrupted, or even troubled by the ring. This is one of those areas where it feels to me like PJ and Co underestimated how great a job they'd done telling this story, so having one guy, Faramir not lusting after the ring, like Frodo, Sam, Gandalf, Galadriel, Celeborn, Elrond, Legolas, Gimli, Aragorn, Merry, Pippin etc (and even Thorin and company), would not instantly make us the audience think "Well I guess this ring thing isn't dangerous at all!". I'm not aware that anybody has ever worried about why somebody like Pippin never gave the ring a second glance (although he was easily corrupted by the Palantir). I reckon there was a middle ground, where they could have more subtly re-written Faramir to be less easily resistant to the rings power but more imbued by the wisdom that his mighty brother lacked.

Still, I would like to see more of the Houses of Healing with Faramir and Eowyn.

Yes. Although many claim RotK had too many endings, it had too few endings for me. But again I can totally understand that from a dramatic stand point, you'd want to roll credits as soon after Sauron is defeated as possible.
 

Moe_Syzlak

Well-known member
Messages
3,456
Reaction score
1,165
Trophy Points
118
RotK has too many endings for the theatrical release. Any and all endings after “you bow to no one” belong in the EE and would be most welcome there.
 

TM2YC

Take Me To Your Cinema
Staff member
Donor
Faneditor
Messages
14,871
Reaction score
2,384
Trophy Points
228
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Although I think all three Peter Jackson 'Lord of the Rings' films are masterpieces, I usually consider 'The Two Towers' to be the weakest. But after finishing re-reading the book (the day before re-watching this), 'The Return of the King' feels like a poor adaptation of the third volume, setting aside how entertaining and emotional it is as an epic spectacular in it's own right. To be clear, the last time I watched RotK (2-years ago) I declared it to perhaps be the best of three films and I still love it.

FotR felt like a near perfect translation of the book, TTT changed a couple of places but RotK guts the novel. It starts off with the problem of having to adapt 8 chapters from TTT left over from the middle movie. Frodo and Sam's story is beautifully told and Gandalf perhaps gets more focus than he does in the book, which I love and Pippin gets some magical moments but the other characters lose out, especially Aragorn (who should be the title character). In the book he rides to the big battle with a company of his Dunedain rangers, defeats the enemies in southern Gondor, and raises an army of it's citizens, uses them to capture the black ships and comes to the rescue of Minas Tirith but in the film he's a passenger of the huge, overpowered and undefeatable army of the dead. Aragorn healing people with his magic "I'm the rightful King" powers is a massive deal in the book, but it's dealt with in a couple of unexplained shots in a montage in the film. In the book there is a real sense than Aragorn earns his place as the new king through his deeds, proving himself to the lords of Gondor, Rohan and Dol Amroth (which is also cut) and being reluctant to assume the kingship, until his claim has been proved. Faramir and Arwen's love is cut down to the bare minimum needed to have it in the film. Merry's warm relationship with Theoden is also trimmed to the bare bones, here Merry asks "can I be a squire of Rohan" and Theoden is like "yeah sure whatever". The sons of Elrond do not appear, which was an odd choice considering PJ inserted the Elves into Helm's Deep because he was concerned about them not playing a part in the war. The scouring of the Shire is of course missing but I doubt it could have worked in a theatrical film context. I will never not miss Butterbur in these movies, him being told Strider is the new King and likes a drop of Bree ale, is one of my favourite moments. The film is lacking some of that impression of there being ordinary people populating this world, who flock to Aragorn's banner, or who have to flee inside the besieged city. The omission of city guard Beregond and his son Bergil as characters means we don't get to see what Minas Tirith is actually like as a living place, rather than just a setting for a battle and what it's people think and feel about the events. Even Gollum's portrayal doesn't have the touching moment where Frodo says they should forgive him because without him the quest couldn't have been achieved (as Gandalf predicted).

I've been reading a book of maps along with the novel (*). The 1st film is virtually 100% accurate, TTT is pretty damned close but RotK is the only one of the trilogy that outright f**ks with the geography. Aragorn emerges from the paths of the dead within sight of the Corsair ships (presumably somewhere upstream from Pelargir), instead of him needing to travel about 90 leagues (or 310 miles and 4-days riding) to get there. Frodo and Sam's journey in Mordor is very vaguely depicted and they don't spend 10-days sneaking around the mountain sides before approaching Orodruin from the north. They just more or less cross the Plain of Gorgoroth straight east from just above the tower of Cirith Ungol. The Rammas Echor outer walls of Minas Tirith are mentioned in one line of dialogue, can be seen off in the distance if you squint in one shot and certainly don't play any tactical part in the battle of Pelennor Fields. The fields aren't shown to be rich farm lands, they are just a flat arid expanse waiting for a battle. The Mumakil and indeed every enemy is shown bluntly attacking from the East/Mordor, where as they they should have approached from the South, so that Aragorn's forces attacked their flank when he arrived in the nick of time.

20-years later the FX still hold up (apart from that terrible shot where Frodo is running into the Cracks of Doom but the primitive motion-tracking is so far off he looks to be skating. The model work is outstanding, so it's able to have the real actors standing right in front of the models and the detail looks full scale. The Mumakil battle is up there with the Battle of Hoth, if not better. The intercutting of Pippin's song and Faramir's charge is incredible, Ian McKellen's speeches are some of the greatest performances ever, Gandalf riding out on Shadowfax to oppose the Nazgul gives me goosebumps and pretty much any time Sean Astin and Elijah Wood look at each other in this final chapter I nearly start crying. The beacons being lit and the music is cinematic majesty.

(For the record, this was the Extended Edition this time.)



^ Pure epicness!

* Barbara Strachey's incredibly detailed 'Journey's of Frodo' (she draws the black and red inked maps so they look like Tolkien did them). Highly recommended:

maxresdefault.jpg


51012a6e3df64874cb3e2086da3808e3c56f72f0v2_hq.jpg




The Return of the King: The Appendices - Part 5: The War of the Ring / Part 6: The Passing of an Age (2004)
Another 7-hours of magic watching the last of Peter Jackson's trilogy get finished. The interviews with the cast and crew were filmed after the multi-year project was finally over and they'd won 11-Oscars, so they all seem to be bursting with pride, relieved that it's finally over and possibly starting to feel nostalgic for the times they'd spent in New Zealand. The anecdote about Viggo Mortensen buying Arwen's expensive stallion for her stunt rider (who could no way have afforded it) chokes me up every time. Vigo also bought his own Aragorn horse but makes it clear that he didn't "sleep with the horse" as the onset jokey rumours said, he just slept in the stable to form a close bond. Elijah Wood's story about Jack Nicholson asking him if Frodo died in the end because he left the movie early to go get the car was pretty funny. I'd forgotten how big of a crunch finishing this was, with them doing the soundmix to a pre-viz rough cut, scoring incomplete scenes and PJ claiming he never actually had time to watch the finished film before the premiere. Telling Elijah Wood beforehand that "he was looking forward to seeing it too!".




The Return of the King: Behind the Scenes (2006)
Ian McKellen
recording Gandalf's big finale line as "Now come the days of the Queen" in a beehive wig and pink flowers is the definite highlight of this doc. They must have the actual 35mm footage of it somewhere, just waiting for it to be cut into a fanedit, where that's the only change. The first design of the Witch-King seen here (before reshoots), with a tall "Lord Buckethead" helm (modelled on the iconic John Howe painting) and dangerous looking spiky mace, looked way better than the "Ghostface" from 'Scream' with a stupidly big flail re-design. Michael Pellerin's documentary shows the grind to get the third film finished but it's more focused on the emotion and upbeat pride of getting it over the line and having got all those Oscars. Costa Botes' film depicts more of the utter exhaustion of the crew. He's got a brief chat (during a tea break) with awesome Weta Workshop head Richard Taylor, where he looks f**ked and mentions that him and his wife have been doing endless 100-hour weeks with no days off.

 
Top Bottom